After a disappointing road trip that saw them lose six of nine, the Mets were able to rebound upon returning home. A series victory over a local team of aging veterans and no-name youngsters helped them extend their division lead. And at long last something was done about the Lima problem.
Having compiled an ERA of 8.79 in 14.1 innings over the course of three starts, Jose Lima was designated for assignment, hopefully never to return. He will be replaced in the rotation by Cuban defector Alay Soler, who was excellent in his brief stay in the minor leagues. In eight starts in high-A and AA ball, he put up an ERA of 2.03 with 54 strikeouts and 11 walks in 47.2 innings. Cuban pitchers and guys who've never pitched above AA are far from sure bets, but it's nice to see the Mets taking a chance on a guy with some potential rather than another washed up veteran. Soler will start on Wednesday against the Phillies. We'll just have to wait to see if he can provide some stability to the back end of the Mets' rotation.
One thing that will be very stable about that back end of the rotation is that it won't contain Victor Zambrano. Surgery on Zambrano's elbow was more severe than expected, leading some to speculate that his career might be over. The elbow was injured the day the Mets acquired him and he was apparently pitching through pain without telling anyone earlier this season. Meanwhile, Scott Kazmir leads the American League in wins and is second in both ERA and strikeouts. Hopefully the current Mets regime can at least learn something from this trade that looked terrible the day it happened and just keeps getting worse. But I'd settle for it haunting former Mets GM and current Orioles VP of baseball operations Jim Duquette until the end of his days.
On a brighter note, the Mets have a three-game lead in the NL East and begin a series with the suddenly struggling Phillies on Tuesday. The Phillies are lucky in that neither Pedro Martinez nor Tom Glavine will pitch in this series. But with Lima gone, even the back of the Mets' rotation holds reason for optimism. It is a new day in Flushing.
3 comments:
I certainly can understand Mets fans being upset with the Kazmir deal. But there is no guarantee that he would as successful in NY, where there would be tremendous pressure and expectations, as in TB, where no one cares.
Two words: Jeff Weaver.
Still, trading your top pitching prospect for a guy who's injured and leading the American League in walks in an attempt to get back in a race you have no chance of winning is about a dumb a move as a team can make. Even putting aside Kazmir's potential, it showed a gross miscalculation of both Zambrano's worth and the Mets' place in the standings. They were in no position to be making "win now" moves in July of 2004. Giving up prospects for a guy even they admitted needed to be fixed just made no sense from any angle.
And Jeff Weaver never put up numbers like those of Kazmir's first two minor league seasons.
I understand where you're coming from. After all, I cut up one of my Tigers T-shirts and mailed it to Dave Dombrowski after the Weaver trade because I was so ticked off.
Weaver only made 7 starts in the minors, but struck out like 50 and walked only 2.
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